Decolonizing Inclusive Education through Trauma-Informed Theories

Notwithstanding its noble orientations and social justice foundations, inclusion has been contested, interrogated, and subjected to multiple interpretations and enactments. Inclusive education has been, inter alia, characterized as a neo-colonial project that is embroiled in and reinforces geopolitical power asymmetries and oppressive regimes. The article suggests that the enduring legacy of colonial perspectives needs to be problematized and challenged through a trauma-responsive lens that captures the traumatizing effects of colonialism/ty on the ‘lived’ realities of disabled and other disenfranchised groups of students. Trauma is a constituent element of intersectional oppression stemming from and imbricated in conditions of colonial structures of power that conceal and legitimize social inequalities, extreme poverty, malnutrition, violence, substandard childcare, racism, and other ‘cultural’ traumas. This is an issue that highlights the imperative of developing theories of inclusion that acknowledge and address the intersections of colonialism/ty, disability and trauma and their impact on educational accessibility, participation, and achievement.